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English-Classic-Series 


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AND HIS FRIENDS 
BY JOHN BROWN 


£s- 


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NEW YORK; 

Clark & Maynard, Publishers, 

734 Broadway. 

1884 

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LANGUAGE LESSONS-GRAMMAR-COMPOSITION. 


' A Complete Course in Two Books Only. - 


1. GRADED LESSONS IN ENGLISH. 

168 pages, 16mo. Bound in linen. 

2. HIGHER LESSONS IN ENGLISH. 

288 pages, 16mo. Bound in cloth. 

By Alonzo Heed, A.M., Instructor in English Grammar in Brook, 
lyn Collegiate and Polytechnic Institute ; and Brainerd Kellogg, 
A.M., Professor of English Language and Literature in Brooklyn 
Collegiate and Polytechnic Institute. 


TWELVE POINTS WHEREIN WE CLAIM THESE WORKS TO EXCEL. 

Plan. — The science of the* language Is made tributary to the a F t of expression. 
Every principle is fixed in memory and in practice, by an exhaus\ iv© drill in com- 
posing sentences, arranging and rearranging their parts, contracting, expanding, 
punctuating, and criticising them. There is thus given a complete course in tech- 
nical grammar and composition , more thorough and attractive than ’f each subject 
were treated separately. 

Grammar and Composition taught together. — We claim tint grammar 
and composition can be better and more economically taught together than sepa- 
rately ; that each helps the other and furnishes the occasion to teach the other ; and 
that botn can be taught together in the time that would be required for either alone. 

A Complete Course in Grammar and Composition, in only tivo Books . 
— The two books completely cover the ground of grammar and composition, from 
the time the scholar usually begins the study until it is finished in the High School or 
Academy. 

Method .— The author’s method in teaching In these books is as follows : (1) The 
principles are presented inductively in the “Hints for Oral Instruction.” (2) This 
instruction is carefully gathered up in brief definitions for the pupil to memorize. 
(8) A variety of exercises in analysis, parsing, and composition is given, which im- 
press the principles on the mind of the scholar and compel him to understand them. 

Authors— Practical Teachers.— The books were prepared by men who have 
made a life-work of teaching grammar and composition, and both of them occupy 
high positions in their profession. 

Grading.— No pains have been spared in grading the books so as to afford the 
least possible difficulty to the young student. This is very important and could 
scarcely be accomplished bv any who are not practical teachers. 

Definitions .—The definitions, principles, and rules are stated in the same lan* 
guage in both books, and cannot be excelled. 

Models for Parsing.—' The models for parsing are simple, original and worthy 
of careful attention. 

System of Diagrams . — The system of diagrams, although it forms no vital pa: 
of the works, is the best extant. The advantage of the use of diagrams is : (1) The; 
present the analysis to the eye. (2) They are stimulating and helpful to the pupil i 
the preparation of his lessons. (3) They enable the teacher to examine the work c 
a class in about the time he could examine one pupil, if the oral method alone werel 
used. ] 

Sentences for Analysis.— The sentences for analysis have been selected with! 
great care and are of unusual excellence. . I 

Questions and Bevieivs.— There is a more thorough system of questions andl 
reviews than in any other works of the kind. 

Cheapness.— In introducing these books, there is a great saving of money, as! 
the prices for first introduction, and for subsequent use, are very low. 


CLARK & MAYNARD, Publishers 

734 Broadway 


rs, ! 
, N. T. I 


NO. 52. 

ENGLISH CLASSIC SERIES. 


Rab and His Friends, 

v' 

By John Brown, M.D., 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY 

ALBERT F. BLAISDELL, A.M., 

AUTHOR OF “OUTLINES FOR THE STUDY OF ENGLISH CLASSICS,” 
“MEMORY Q,UOTATIQN^5* r ~ tT SH^K'ESP.EARE SPEAKER,” ETC. 






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DEO 29 1C' 

J'CF WfkSH'*’ 



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NEW YORK: 

Clark & Maynard, Publishers, 
734 Broadway. 


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Text-Book on Rhetoric-. 

Supplementing the Development of the Science with 
Exhaustive Practice in Composition. 

A COURSE OP PRACTICAL LESSONS ADAPTED POR USE IN HIGH-SCHOOLS 
AND ACADEMIES AND IN THE LOWER CLASSES OP COLLEGES. 


By BRAIN EBB KELLOGG, A.M., 

Professor of the English Language and Literature in the Brooklyn Collegiate 
and Polytechnic Institute , and one of the authors of Peed & Kellogg's 
Graded Lessons in English” and “ Higher Lessons in English 


In preparing this work upon Rhetoric, the author's aim has been to 
write a practical text-book for High-Schools, Academies, and the lower 
classes of Colleges, based upon the science rather than an exhaustive 
treatise upon the science itself. 

This work has grown up out of the belief that the rhetoric which the 
pupil needs is not that which lodges finally in the memory, but that 
which has worked its way down into his tongue and fingers, enabling 
him to speak and write the better for having studied it. The author be- 
lieves that the aim of the study should be to put the pupil in possession 
of an art, and that this can be done not by forcing the science into him 
through eye and ear, but by drawing it out of him, in products, through 
tongue and pen. Hence all explanations of principles are followed by 
exhaustive practice in Composition — to this everything is made tributary. 

When, therefore, under the head of Invention, the author is leading 
the pupil up through the construction of sentences and paragraphs, 
through the analyses of subjects and the preparing of frameworks, to 
the finding of the thought for themes ; when, under the head of Style,' 
he is familiarizing the pupil with its grand, cardinal qualities ; and when, 
under the head of Productions, he divides discourse into oral prose, writ- 
ten prose, and poetry, and these into their subdivisions, giving the re- 
quisites and functions of each — he is aiming in it all to keep sight of the 
fact that the pupil is to acquire an art, and that to attain this he must put 
into almost endless practice with his pen what he has learned from the 
study of the theory. 

276 pages, 12mo, attractively bound in cloth . 

PUBLISHED BY 

CLARK & MAYNARD, 734 Broadway, New York. 

Copyright , 1884, by Clark dr 1 Maynard. 


INTRODUCTION. 


Some twenty years ago, Charles Dickens was in Edinburgh, reading 
his stories in public, and was dining with some Edinburgh people. 
The distinguished novelist began to speak about the panic which the 
cholera had caused in England ; how ill some people had behaved. As 
a contrast, he mentioned that, at Chatham, one poor woman had died, 
deserted by every one except a young physician. Some one, however, 
ventured to open the door, and found the woman dead, and the young 
doctor asleep, overcome with the fatigue that mastered him on his 
patient’s death, but quite untouched by the general panic. “ Why that 
was Dr. John Brown,” one of the guests observed; and it seems thus 
early in his career, “ the beloved physician ” as Dr. Brown was called 
in Edinburgh, had been setting an example of the courage and charity 
of his profession. Dr. John Brown, widely known as the author of 
“Rab and his Friends ” and many delightful essays, was born in 1811, 
in a little town, called Biggar, in the pastoral moorlands of Southern 
Scotland. This was the region, the valley of the Tweed, “far the fair- 
est of the floods that run upon the earth,” so beloved by Sir Walter 
Scott. How dear this border scenery was to Dr. Brown, and how well 
he knew and could express its legendary magic, the music of its old 
ballads, the sorcery of its old stories, may be understood by those who 
have read his charming essay on “Minchmoor.” The father of Dr. 
Brown was the third in a lineage of ministers of the sect called “ Seced- 
ers.” Dr. Brown’s great-grandfather had been a shepherd boy, who 
taught himself Greek that he might read the New Testament; who 
walked twenty-four miles— leaving his folded sheep in the night— to 
buy the precious volume in St. Andrews, and who finally, became a 
teacher of much repute among his own people. Dr. Brown wrote a 
touching and beautiful account of his father in his “Letter to John 
Cairns.” This essay contains, perhaps, the very finest passages that 
the author ever wrote. His sayings about his own childhood remind 
one of the quaint and tender touches of the “gentle Elia.” When the 
father received a call to a church in Edinburgh, the son became a pupil 
of that ancient Scotch Seminary, the High School,— the school where 
Sir Walter Scott was taught “not much Latin and no Greek worth 
mentioning.” This great master of fiction was still alive and strong in 


4 


INTRODUCTION, 


those days. He lived in Edinburgh, and Dr. Brown tells us how he and 
his schoolmates used to take off their hats to Sir Walter as he passed 
in the streets. We have a glimpse into Brown’s school days in the 
opening part of “Rab and his Friends,” in which the dog-fight is 
described. Six years passed and the high school boy becomes a medi- 
cal student and clerk at Minto Hospital. How he renewed his acquaint- 
ance there, and under what sad circumstances, with Rab and his 
friends, it is superfluous to tell, for every one who reads has read the 
story, and most readers not without tears. As a medical student at 
Edinburgh, our young doctor made the friendship of Mr. Syme, the 
famous surgeon,— a friendship only closed by death. The kind and 
gentle surgeon who removes the cancer from Ailie’s breast is, of course, 
Mr. Syme whom Dr. Brown ever regarded with the reverence of a dis- 
ciple, as well as with the affection of a friend. When his studies were 
over the young doctor practised for a year as assistant to a surgeon in 
Chatham. Afterwards he returned to Edinburgh, where he spent the 
rest of his life as a busy and successful physician. He devoted his 
“ spare hours ” to literature. Three volumes of essays are all that Dr. 
Brown has left in the way of literary work, “a light but imperishable 
literary baggage.” These essays have been republished in a series of 
three volumes under the name of “Spare Hours.” His studies are 
usually derived from personal experience, which he reproduced with 
singular geniality and simplicity ; or they are drawn from the tradi- 
tions of the long-lived Scotch people, who, themselves had listened 
attentively to those who went before them. He chiefly studied and 
best wrote of the characters of humor and pathos which he met with 
in his life and profession, children, dogs, Scotch scenery and fellow- 
workers in life and medicine. Under one or the other of these heads, 
all his best writings might be arranged. The most famous and most 
exquisite of all his works is the unrivaled “Rab and his Friends”— a 
study of the stoicism and tenderness of the Lowland character wbrthy 
of Scott. “ Her last Half Crown ” is another study of the honesty that 
survived in a starving and outcast Scotch girl. Among the genial doc- 
tor’s papers on children, that called “ Pet Marjorie ” holds the highest 
place. It is the story of little Marjorie Fleming, the precocious child, 
so loved by Sir Walter Scott. The memory of this fairy-like child 
remains sweet and blossoming in its dust, like that of little Penelope 
Boohby, the child in the mob cap whom Sir Joshua Reynolds painted 
and whose sweet face is found on sale in every picture dealer’s collec- 
tions even to this day. “Queen Mary’s Child Garden ” is a description 
of the little garden in which Mary Queen of Scots played when a child. 
“Our Dogs” is a good second to “Rab,” containing some choice bits 
about the good doctor’s favorite dogs. 

Like most people of kindly and joyous temperament, Dr. Brown was 
subject to fits of melancholy, or “ the blues,” in which the world seemed 
very dark to him. With his habitual unselfishness, he kept his mel- 
ancholy to himself, and, though he did not care for society at such 


INTRODUCTION 


5 


times, he said nothing of his own condition that could distress his 
friends. In the last year of his life, he was less subject to these spells 
and even returned to his literary work. Three editions of a new 
volume of essays were published in some six weeks a few weeks before 
his death. A cold settled on his lungs, and in spite of the most affec- 
tionate nursing, he grew rapidly weaker. He had little suffering at the 
end, and his mind remained unclouded. He died May 11, 1882. No 
man of letters could be more widely regretted, for he was the friend of 
all who read his books, as, even to people who only met him once or 
twice in life, he seemed to become dear and familiar. His popularity 
in this country was even greater than in Scotland. He was often vis- 
ited by Americans whom he hospitably received. The praise which 
Oliver Wendell Holmes gave his work afforded him much pleasure. 
Of Americans he used to say: “They are more alive than we are.” 
During his long and busy life, as a doctor and as a man of letters, Dr. 
Brown was dearly beloved. His sweetness of disposition and charm of 
manner, his humor and his unfailing sympathy and encouragement, 
made one feel toward him as- to a familiar friend. When you met him, 
he had some “ good story ” or some story of goodness to tell, — for both 
came alike to him, and his humor was as unfailing as his kindness. 
There was in his face a singular charm, blended, as it were, with the 
expressions of mirth and of patience. He was keenly sensitive to pain, 
as well as to pleasure. He did not bear easily the misfortunes of 
others, and the evils of his own lot were heavy enough. They saddened 
his life ; but neither illness, nor his own deep anxiety for others, could 
sour a nature so unselfish. Wherever he came, “ the beloved physi- 
cian ” was welcome ; people felt glad when they met him in the streets, 
—the streets of Edinburgh, where almost every one knew him by sight. 
He was as cordially received by the children and the dogs as by the 
grown-up people of every family. 

The following lines, for example, are a revelation of childish psychol- 
ogy, and probably may be applied, with as much truth, to the child- 
hood of our race : 

“ Children are long of seeing, or at least of looking at what is above 
them ; they like the ground, and its flowers and stones, its 1 red sodgers’ 
and lady birds, and all its queer things ; their world is about three feet 
high , and they are more often stooping than gazing up. I know I was 
past ten before I saw, or cared to see, the ceilings of the rooms in the 
manse at Biggar.” 

In his essay on his father, Dr. Brown has written lines about a 
child’s first knowledge of death, which seem as noteworthy as Steele’s 
famous passage* about his father’s death, and his own half-conscious 


* I remember I went into the room where my father’s body lay, and 
my mother sat weeping alone by it. I had my battledore in my hand, 
and fell a-beating the coffin and calling ‘ Papa,’ for. I know not how, I 
had some slight idea that he was locked up there.’’— Steele, “The Tat- 
ler,” June 6, 1710. 


6 


INTRODUCTION, 


grief and anger. Dr. Brown de^ribes a Scottish funeral — the funeral 
of his own mother— as he saw it with the eyes of a boy five years old, 
while his younger brother, a baby of a few months old ; “ leaped up and 
crowed with joy at the strange sight,— the crowding horsemen, the 
coaches, and the nodding plumes of the hearse. * * * Then, to my 
surprise and alarm, the coffin, resting on its bearers, was placed over 
the dark hole, and I watched with curious eye the unrolling of those 
neat black bunches of cords, which I have often enough seen since. 
My father took the one at the head, and also another much smaller, 
springing from the same point as his, which he had caused to be placed 
there, and unrolling it, put it into my hand. I twisted it firmly round 
my fingers, and awaited the result ; the burial men with their real 
ropes lowered the coffin, and when it rested at the bottom it was too 
far down for me to see it. The grave was down very deep, as he used 
afterward to tell us, that it might hold us all. My father first ab- 
ruptly let his cord drop, followed by the rest. This was too much. I 
now saw what was meant, and held on and fixed my fist and feet, and 
I believe my father had some difficulty in forcing open my small fin- 
gers ; he let the little black cord drop, and I remember, in my misery 
and anger, seeing its open end disappearing in the gloom.” 

In one of his very latest essays, “On Thackeray’s Death,” Dr. Brown 
told us how good, kind, and thoughtful for others was this great mas- 
ter of fiction. Some of these lines he wrote of Thackeray might well 
be applied to himself: “ He looked always fresh, with that abounding 
silvery hair, and his young, almost infantine face ”— a face very pale, 
and yet radiant, in his last years, and mildly lit up with eyes full of 
kindness, and softened by sorrow. 

In his last year, Swinburne, the English poet, wrote to Dr. Brown 
this sonnet, in which there seems something of the poet’s prophetic 
gift, and a voice sounds as of a welcome home— 

“ Beyond the north wind lay the land of old, 

Where men dwelt blithe and blameless, clothed and fed 
With joy’s bright raiment, and with love’s sweet bread,— 

The whitest flock of earth’s maternal fold. 

None there might wear about his brows enrolled 
A light of lovelier fame than rings your head, 

Whose lonesome love of children and the dead 
All men give thanks for ; I, far off, behold 
A dear dead hand that links us, and a light 
The blithest and benignest of the night,— 

The night of death’s sweet sleep, wherein may be 
A star to show your spirit in present sight 
Some happier isle in the Elysian sea . 

Where Rab may lick the hand of Marjorie,” 


/ 


author's preface. 

(ABRIDGED.) 


I have to apologize for bringing in “ Rab and his Friends.” I did so 
remembering well the good I got then, as a man and as a doctor. It let 
me see down into the depths of our common nature, and feel the strong 
and gentle touch that we all need, and never forget, which makes the 
world kin; and it gave an opportunity of introducing, in a way which 
he cannot dislike, for he knows it is simply true, my old master and 
friend, Prof. Syme, whose indenture I am thankful I possess, and whose 
first wheels I delight in thinking my apprentice-fee purchased, thirty 
years ago. I remember as if it were yesterday, his giving me the first 
drive across the west shoulder of Corstorphine Hill. On starting, he 
said, “John, we’ll do one thing at a time, and there will be no talk.’ 
I sat silent and rejoicing, and can remember the very complexion and 
clouds of that day and that matchless view. 

I need hardly add that the story of “Rab and his Friends” is in all 
essentials strictly matter of fact. 

October 30, 1858. 


POST PREFACE. 


I have to thank the public and my own special craft cordially for 
their taking to their hearts that great old dog and his dead friends,— 
for all which the one friend who survives thanks them. There is no 
harm and some good in letting our sympathy and affection go forth 
without stint on such objects, dead and homely though they be. 

When I think of that noble head, with its look and eye of boundless 
affection and pluck, simplicity and single-heartedness, I feel what it 
would be for us, who call ourselves the higher animals, to be in our 
ways as simple, affectionate, and true, as that old mastiff ; and in the 
highest of all senses, I often think of what Robert Burns says some- 


8 


PREFACE. 


where, “Man is the god of the dog.” It would be well for man if his 
worship were as immediate and instinctive— as absolute as the dog’s. 
Did we serve our God with half the zeal Rab served his, we might trust 
to sleep as peacefully in our graves as he does in his. When James 
turned his angry eye and raised his quick voice and foot, his worship- 
per slunk away, humbled and afraid, angry with himself for making 
him angry ; anxious by any means to crouch back into his favor, and a 
kind look or word. Is that the way we take His displeasure, even 
when we can’t think as Rab couldn’t, we were immediately to blame? 

It is, as the old worthy says, something to trust our God in the dark, 
as the dog does his. 

A dear and wise and exquisite child, drew a plan for a headstone on 
the grave of a favorite terrier, and she had on it the words “who died” 
on such a day; the older and more worldly-minded painter put in 
“which:” and my friend and “ Bossy’s ” said to me, with some dis- 
pleasure, as we were examining the monuments, “ Wasn’t he a who as 
much as they?” 

October 13, 1859. 


NOTE TO THE FIRST AMERICAN EDITION. 


The author of “Rab and his Friends ” scarcely needs an introduction 
to American readers. By this time many have learned to agree with a 
writer in the “North British Review” that “Rab” is, in all things con- 
sidered, the most perfect prose narrative since Lamb’s “Rosamond 
Gray.” A new world of doctors, clergymen, shepherds, and carriers is 
revealed in the writings of this cheerful Edinburgh scholar, who 
always brings genuine human feeling, strong sense, and fine genius to 
the composition of his papers. Dogs he loves with an enthusiasm to 
be found nowhere else in canine literature. He knows intimately all 
a cur means when he winks his eye or wags his tail, so that the whole 
barking race,— terrier, mastiff, spaniel, and the rest,— finds in him an 
affectionate and interested friend. His genial motto seems to run thus 
— “ I cannot understand that morality which excludes animals from 
human sympathy, or releases man from the debt and obligation he 
owes to them. 

Dr. Brown is an eminent practising physician in Edinburgh, with 
small leisure for literary composition, but no one has stronger claims 
to be ranked among the purest and best writers of our day. 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


Four and thirty years ago, Bob Ainslie and I were coming 
up Infirmary street 1 from the high school, our heads togeth- 
er, and our arms intertwisted, as only lovers and boys 
know how or why. 

When we got to the top of the street, and turned north, 
we espied a crowd at the Tron church. “A dog fight !’ 7 
shouted Bob, and was off ; and so was I, both of us' all but 
praying that it might not be over before we got up ! And is 
not this boy nature ! and human nature too ? and don 7 t we 
all wish a house on fire not to be out before we see it ? Dogs 
like fighting ; old Isaac 2 * * says they “ delight 77 in it, and for 
the best of all reasons ; and boys are not cruel because they 
like to see the fight. They see three of the great cardinal 
virtues of dog or man — courage, endurance, and skill — in in- 
tense action. This is very different from a love of making 
dogs fight, and enjoying, and aggravating, and making gain 
b^ their pluck. A boy — be he ever so fond himself of fight- 
ing, if he be a good boy, hates and despises all this, but he 
would have run off with Bob and me fast enough ; it is a 
natural, and a not wicked interest, that all boys and men 
have in witnessing intense energy in action. 

Does any curious and finely-ignorant woman wish to know 
how Bob 7 s eye at a glance announced a dog-fight to his 
brain ? He did not, he could not see the dogs fighting ; it 


1. There are several local references in this sketch to places in and 
about the city of Edinburgh which will explain themselves. 

2. Old Isaac. — The reference is to the familiar verses of Isaac Watts, 

the great author of religious hymns, “ Dogs delight to bark and bite,’ 7 

etc. 


10 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


was a flash of an inference, a rapid induction. The crowd 
round a couple of dogs fighting, is a crowd masculine mainly, 
with an occasional active, compassionate woman, fluttering 
wildly round the outside, and using her tongue and her 
hands freely upon the men, as so many “brutes it is a 
crowd annular, compact and mobile ; a crowd centripetal, 
having its eyes and its heads all bent downwards and in- 
wards, to one common focus.. 

Well, Bob and I are up, and find it is not over ; a small 
thoroughbred, white bull-terrier , 3 is busy throttling a large 
shepherd’s dog, unaccustomed to war, but not to be trifled 
with. They are hard at it ; the scientific little fellow doing 
his work in great style, his pastoral enemy fighting wildly, 
but with the sharpest of teeth and a* * great courage. Science 
and breeding, however, soon had their own ; the Game 
Chicken, as the premature Bob called him, working his way 
up, took his final grip of poor Yarrow’s throat, — and he lay 
gasping and done for. His master, a brown, handsome, big 
young shepherd from Tweedsmuir, would have liked to have 
knocked down any man, would “drink up Esil, or eat a 
crocodile,”* for that part, if he had a chance ; it was no use 
kicking the little dog ; that would only make him hold the 
closer. Many were the means shouted out in mouthfuls, of 
the best possible ways of ending it. “Water!” but there 
was none near, and many cried for it who might have got it 
from the well at Blackfriars Wynd. “Bite the tail !” and 
a large, vague, benevolent, middle-aged man, more desirous 
than wise, with some struggle got the bushy end of Yarrow’s 
tail into his ample mouth, and bit it with all his might. 
This was more than enough for the much-enduring, much- 
perspiring shepherd, who, with a gleam. of joy over his 
broad visage, delivered a terrific facer upon our large, vague, 
benevolent, middle-aged friend, — who went down like a shot. 


3. In connection with the text read a good description with anecdotes 
of these two breeds of dogs from some of the many interesting books 
on dogs. 

* A familiar phrase meaning ever ready to drink strong liquor or 
eat anything set before him. Like the more common Scotch expres- 
sion, “ to drink the river Clyde dry.” 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


11 


Still the Chicken holds; death not far off. “Snuff! a 
pinch of snuff !” observed a calm, highly-dressed young 
buck, with an eye-glass in his eye. “ Snuff, indeed !” 
growled the angry crowd, affronted and glaring. “ Snuff! 
a pinch of snuff!” again observes the buck, but with more 
urgency ; whereupon were produced several open boxes, and 
from a mull 4 which may have been at Culloden , 5 he took a 
pinch, knelt down, and presented it to the nose of the 
Chicken. The laws of physiology and of snuff take their 
course ; the Chicken sneezes, and Yarrow is free. 

The young pastoral giant stalks off with Yarrow in his 
arms, — comforting him. 

But the bull-terrier’s blood is up, and his soul unsatisfied ; 
he^grips the first dog he meets, and discovering she is not a 
dog, in Homeric phrase, he makes a brief sort of amend ■,* 
and is off. The boys, with Bob and me at their head, are 
after him ; down Niddry street he goes, bent on mischief ; 
up the Cowgate like an arrow — Bob and I, and our small 
men, panting behind. 

There, under the single arch of the South bridge is a huge 
mastiff, sauntering down the middle of the causeway, as if 
with his hands in his pockets ; he is old, gray, brindled, as 
big as a little Highland bull, and has the Shaksperian dew- 
laps 6 shaking as he goes. 

The Chicken makes straight at him, and fastens on his 
throat. To our astonishment, the great creature does noth- 
ing but stand still, hold himself up, and roar — yes, roar ; a 
long, serious, remonstrative roar. How is this ? Bob and I 
are up to them. He is muzzled ! The bailies 7 had pro- 


4. Mull.— (Gaelic maol , a promentory, point of land.) A snuff-box 
made of the small end of a horn ; a snuff-box of any kind. 

5. Culloden.— A wide, moory ridge in Inverness county, Scotland: 
Famous for the total defeat of Prince Charles’ army in 1746. 

* Apology. 

6. Dewlaps. — The fold of skin that hangs down from the throat of 
animals (as in oxen and cows) and which laps or licks the dew in graz- 
ing. Thus in Shakespeare : 

“ And when she drinks against her lips I bob, 

And on the withered dewlap pour the ale.” 

7. Bailies.— Municipal officers or magistrates in Scotland. They have 
certain jurisdiction by common law as well as by statute. 


12 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


claimed a general muzzling, and his master, studying 
strength and economy mainly, had encompassed his huge 
jaws in a home-made apparatus, constructed out of the 
leather of some ancient breecliin. His mouth was open as 
far as it could ; his lips curled up in rage — a sort of terrible 
grin ; his teeth gleaming, ready, from out the darkness ; the 
strap across his mouth tense as a bowstring ; his whole 
frame stiff with indignation and surprise ; his roar asking 
us all round, “ Did you ever see the like of this ?” He looked 
a statue of anger and astonishment, done in Aberdeen 8 9 
granite. 

We soon had a crowd ; the Chicken held on. “A knife !” 
cried Bob ; and a cobbler gave him his knife ; you know 
the kind of knife, worn away obliquely to a point, and 
always keen. I put its edge to the tense leather ; it ran 
before it ; and then ! — one sudden jerk of that enormous 
head, a sort of dirty mist about his mouth, no noise, and the 
bright and fierce little fellow is dropped, limp, and dead. A 
solemn pause ; this was more than any of us had bargained 
for. I turned the little fellow over, and saw he was quite 
dead ; the mastiff had taken him by the small of the back, 
like a rat, and broken it. 

He looked down at his victim appeased, ashamed and 
amazed ; snuffed him all over, stared at him, and taking a 
sudden thought, turned round and trotted off. Bob took 
the dead dog up, and said, “John, we’ll bury him after 
tea.” “Yes,” said I, and was off after the mastiff. He 
made up the Cowgate 9 at a rapid swing ; he had forgotten 
some engagement. He turned up the Candlemaker Bow, 
and stopped at the Harrow Inn. 

There was a carrier’s cart ready to start, and a keen, thin, 
impatient, black-a-vised little man, his hand at his gray 
horse’s head looking about angrily for something. “Bab, 

8. Aberdeen granite.— A county in Scotland. Well known for its 
excellent granite. There is a flourishing city of the same name in the 
county. 

9. The quaint, odd names of various sections of Edinburgh, as well 
as the names of localities in the other English and Scottish towns, 
strike our ears as something unique. Dickens delighted to locate his 
characters in these quainLsounding sections of London. 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


13 


ye thief ! ”said he, aiming a kick at my great friend, who 
drew cringing up, and avoiding the heavy shoe with more 
agility than dignity, and watching his master’s eye, slunk 
dismayed under the cart — his ears down, and as much as he 
had of tail down too. 

What a man this must be — thought I — to whom my tre- 
mendous hero turns tail ! The carrier saw the muzzle hang- 
ing, cut and useless, from his neck, and I eagerly told him 
the story which Bob and I always thought, and still think, 
Homer, or King David, or Sir Walter, alone were worthy to 
rehearse. 10 The severe little man was mitigated, and conde- 
scended to say, “Bab, ma man, puir Babbie,” — whereupon 
the stump of a tail rose up, the ears were cocked, the eyes 
filled, and were comforted ; the two friends were reconciled. 
“ Hupp ! ” and a stroke of the whip were given to Jess ; and 
off went the three. 

Bob and I buried the Game Chicken that night (we had 
not much of a tea) in the back-green of his house in Mel- 
ville street, No. 17, with considerable gravity and silence ; 
and being at the time in the Iliad, and, like all boys, Tro- 
jans, we called him Hector of course. 

******** 

Six years have passed — a long time for a boy and a dog : 
Bob Ainslie is off to the wars ; I am a medical student, and 
clerk at Minto House Hospital. * 11 

Bab I saw almost every week, on the Wednesday ; and 
we had much pleasant intimacy. I found the way to his 
heart by frequent scratching of his huge head, and an occa- 
sional bone. When I did not notice him he would plant 
himself straight before me, and stand wagging that bud of 
a tail, and looking up, with his head a little to the one side. 
His master I occasionally saw ; he used to call me “ Maister 
John,” but was laconic as any Spartan. 

10. In a mock-heroic way the genial author sympathizes with the 
enthusiasm of a school-boy who naturally associates the heroes of his 
studies with the sports of the street and playground. “Sir Walter,” 
of course, has reference to Sir Walter Scott. 

11. Minto House Hospital.— This is a leaf from the life of Dr. Brown. 
This story in the main is founded on fact. Dr. Brown was a student at 
this great Edinburgh hospital and studied under Syme, the famous 
Scotch surgeon, 


14 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


One fine October afternoon, I was leaving the hospital, 
when I saw the large gate open, and in walked Rab with 
that great and easy saunter of his. He looked as if taking 
general possession of the place ; like the Duke of Welling- 
ton 12 entering a subdued city, satiated with victory and 
peace. After him came Jess, now white from age, with her 
cart ; and in it a woman, carefully wrapped up — the carrier 
leading the horse anxiously, and looking back. When he 
saw me, James (for his name was James Noble) made a curt 
and grotesque “boo,” and said, “ Maister John, this is the 
mistress ; she’s got a trouble in her breest — some kind of an 
income 13 we’re thinkin’.” 

By this time I saw the woman’s face ; she was sitting on 
a sack filled with straw, her husband’s plaid round her, and 
his big-coat, with its large white metal buttons, over her 
feet. 

I never saw a more unforgetable face — pale, serious, lonely ,* * 
delicate, sweet, without being at all what we call fine. She 
looked sixty, and had on a mutch, 1 * white as snow, with its 
black ribbon ; her silvery, smooth hair setting off her dark- 
gray eyes — eyes such as one sees only twice or thrice in a 
lifetime, full of suffering, full also of the overcoming of it ; 
her eyebrows black and delicate, and her mouth firm, 
patient, and contented, which few mouths ever are. 

As I have said, I never saw a more beautiful countenance, 
or a more subdued or settled quiet. “Ailie,” said James, 
“ this is Maister John, the young doctor ; Rab’s freend, ye 
ken. We often speak aboot you, doctor.” She smiled, and 
made a movement, but said nothing ; and prepared to come 
down, putting her plaid aside and rising. Had Solomon, in 
all his glory, been handing down the Queen of Sheba 15 at 

12. Duke of Wellington.— (1769-1852.) One of England’s greatest gen- 
erals. Defeated Napoleon at Waterloo. 

13. Income.— A quaint Scotch word. A disease affecting any part of 
the body which has no apparent cause ; as distinguished from diseases 
induced by accident or contagion. 

“She had got an income in the right arm and could na spin.'-*— Galt. 

* It is not easy giving this look by one word ; it was expressive of her 
being so much of her life alone. 

14. Mutch.— Scotch word. A woman’s head-dress. A cap. 

15. Queen of Sheba.— See 1 Kings, Chap. X : and 2 Chron., Chap. IX. 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


15 


his palace gate, he could not have done it more daintily, 
more tenderly, more like a gentleman, than did James the 
Howgate carrier, when he lifted down Ailie, his wife. 

The contrast of his small, swarthy, weather-beaten, keen, 
worldly face to hers — pale, subdued, and beautiful — was 
something wonderful. Rab looked on concerned and puz- 
zled, but ready for any thing that might turn up — were it to 
strangle the nurse, the porter, or even me. Ailie and he 
seemed great friends. 

“ As I was saying she's got a kind o' trouble in her breest, 
doctor; wull ye tak' a lookat it?" We walked into the 
consulting-room, all four ; Rab grim and comic, willing to 
be happy and confidential if cause could be shown, willing 
also to be the reverse on the same terms. Ailie sat down, 
undid her open gown and her lawn handkerchief round her 
neck, and, without a word, showed me her right breast. I 
looked at and examined it carefully, she and James watch- 
ing me, and Rab eyeing all three. What could I say? 
There it was that had once been so soft, so shapely, so white, 
so gracious and bountiful, so “full of all blessed conditions " 
— hard as a stone , 16 a center of horrid pain, making that pale 
face, with its gray, lucid, reasonable eyes, and its sweet 
resolved mouth, express the full measure of suffering over- 
come. Why was that gentle, modest, sweet woman, clean 
and loveable, condemned by God to bear such a burden ? 

I got her away to bed. “ May Rab and me bide? " said 
James. • “ You may ; and Rab, if he will behave himself." 
“ I'se warrant he's do that, doctor and inslunkthe faith- 
ful beast. I wish you could have seen him. There are no 
such dogs now. He belonged to a lost tribe. As I have 
said, he was brindled, and gray like Rubislaw granite ; 17 his 
hair short, hard, and close, like a lion's ; his body thick set, 
like a little bull — a sort of compressed Hercules of a dog. 
He must have been ninety pounds' weight, at the least ; he 


16. Hard as a stone.— The carrier’s wife was slowly dying of a cancer 
of the breast, commonly known as “rose cancer,” “stone cancer, etc 
Dr. Brown’s description is graphic and life-like. 

17. Rubislaw granite.— A well-known granite quarry in Scotland 
Hercules was the god of physical strength. 


16 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


had a large blunt head ; his muzzle black as hight, his 
mouth blacker than any night, a tooth or two — being all he 
had — gleaming out of his jaws of darkness. His head was 
scarred with the records of old wounds, a sort of series of" 
fields of battle all over it ; one eye out, one ear cropped as 
close as was Archbishop Leighton’s father’s ; 18 the remain- 
ing eye had the power of two ; and above it, and in constant 
communication with it, was a tattered rag of an ear, which 
was forever unfurling itself, like an old flag ; and then that 
bud of a tail, about one inch long, if it could in any sense be 
said to be long, being as broad as long — the mobility, the 
instaneousness of that bud were very funny and surprising, 
and its expressive twinklings and winkings, the intercom- 
munications between the eye, the ear, and it, were of the 
oddest and swiftest. 

Bab had the dignity and simplicity of great size ; and 
having fought his way all along the road to absolute 
supremacy, he was as mighty in his own line as Julius 
Caesar or the Duke of Wellington, and had the gravity 19 of 
all great fighters. 

You must have often observed the likeness of certain men 
to certain animals, and of certain dogs to men . 20 Now, I 
never looked at Rab without thinking of the great Baptist 
preacher, Andrew Fuller . 21 The same large, heavy, menac- 


18. Archbishop Leighton’s father. — The reference is to Dr. Alexander 
Leighton, a noted Scotch Presbyterian minister, who, because he wrote 
a book which reflected on the bishops, was arrested in 1629 and con- 
demned to a horrible punishment. Among other things, he was lashed 
mercilessly, branded on one cheek with a red-hot iron, had one ear cut 
off, and one side of his nose slit. He afterwards spent ten years in 
prison. His son Archbishop Leighton, an eminent divine, is still 
remembered for his masterly commentary on the First Epistle of St. 
Peter. 

19. A Highland gamekeeper, when asked why a certain terrier, of 
singular pluck, was so much more solemn than the other dogs, said, 
“ Oh, Sir, life’s full o’ sairousness to him — he just never can get enuff o’ 
fechtin.’ ” 

20. It is a matter of familiar observation that dogs often times bear a 
striking resemblance to their masters. How often does one who knows 
and studies dogs see the face of some acquaintance mirrored in that of 
a dog. No man ever studied dogs or loved them more than did Dr. 
Brown. Hence his insight into dog-nature as revealed in his various 
sketches is something wonderful. 

21. Fuller was, in early life, when a farmer-lad at Soham, famous as a 
boxer; not quarrelsome, but not without “the stern delight” a man 
of strength and courage feels in their exercise. Dr. Charles Stewart, of 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


17 


ing, combative, sombre, honest countenance, the same 
deep inevitable eye, the same look, — as of thunder asleep, 
but ready, — neither a dog nor a man to be trifled with. 

Next day, my master, the surgeon , 22 examined Ailie. 
There was no doubt it must kill her, and soon. It could be 
be removed — it might never return — it would give her speedy 
relief— she should have it done. She curtsied, looked at 
James, and said, “When?” “ To-morrow, ” said the kind 
surgeon — a man of few words. She and James and Rab 
and I retired. I noticed that he and she spoke a little, but 
seemed to anticipate every thing in each other. The follow- 
ing day at noon, the students came in, hurrying up the 
great stair. At the first landing-place, on a small well- 
known black board, was a bit of paper fastened by wafers 
and many remains of old wafers beside it. On the paper 
were the words, — “An operation to-day. J. B., Clerk” 

Up ran the youths, eager to secure good places ; in they 
crowded, full of interest and talk. “What’s the case? 
Which side is it?” 

Don’t think them heartless ; they are neither better nor 
worse than you or I ; they get over their professional 
horrors, and into their proper work ; and in them phy — as 
an emotion , ending in itself or at best in tears and a long- 
drawn breath, lessens, while pity as a motive , is quickened, 
and gains power and purpose. It well for poor human 
nature that it is so. 

The operating theater is crowded ; much talk and fun, 
and all t^ie cordiality and stir of youth. The surgeon with 
his staff of assistants is there. In conies Ailie ; one look at 
her quiets and abates the eager students. The beautiful 
old woman is too much for them. They sit down, and are 

Dunearn, whose rare gifts and graces as a physician, a divine, a scholar 
and a gentleman, live only in the memory of those few who live and 
survive him, liked to tell how Mr. Fuller used to say, that when he 
was in the pulpit, and saw a buirdly man come along the passage, he 
would instinctively draw himself up, measure his imaginary antago- 
nist, and forecast how he would deal with him. his hands meanwhile 
condensing into fists, and tending to “square.” He must have been a 
hard hitter if he boxed as he preached— what “ Sporting men ” would 
call “ an ugly customer.” 

22. Surgeon.— This was James Syme, an eminent Scotch surgeon, and 
dearly beloved by Dr. Brown. 


18 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


dumb, and gaze at her. These rough boys feel the power of 
her presence. She walks in quickly, but without haste ; 
dressed in her mutch, her neckerchief, her white dimity 23 
short-gown, her black bombazine petticoat, showing her 
white worsted stockings and her carpet-shoes. Behind her 
was James with Rab. James sat down in the distance, and 
took that huge and noble head between his knees. Rab 
looked perplexed and dangerous ; forever cocking his ear 
and dropping it as fast. 

Ailie stepped up on a seat, and laid herself on the table, 
as her friend the surgeon told her ; arranged herself, gave a 
rapid look at James, shut her eyes, rested herself on me, and 
took my hand. The operation was at once begun ; it was 
necessarily slow ; and chloroform 24 — one of God’s best gifts 
to his suffering children — was then unknown. The surgeon 
did his work. The pale face showed its pain, but was still 
and silent. Rab’s soul was working within him ; he saw 
that something strange was going on, — blood flowing from 
his mistress, and she suffering ; his ragged ear was up, and 
importunate ; he growled and gave now and then a sharp 
impatient yelp ; he would have liked to have done some- 
thing to that man. But James had him firm, and gave him 
a glower 25 from time to time, and an intimation of a possible 
kick ; — all the better for James, it kept his eye and his mind 
off Ailie. 

It is over ; she is dressed, steps gently and decently down 
from the table, looks for James ; then, turning to the 
surgeon and the students, she curtsies, — and jn a low, clear 
voice, begs their pardon if she has behaved ill. The 
students — all of us — wept like children ; the surgeon happed 26 

23. Dimity.— A stout cotton fabric, often ornamented in the loom by 
raised stripes or fancy figures. 

24. Chloroform.— The celebrated surgeon Dr. James Y. Simpson of 
Edinburgh, discovered the anaesthetic powers of chloroform and intro- 
duced it into his practice in 1847. Ether, more commonly used in this 
country as an anaesthetic, was first used to prevent the pain of a surgi- 
cal operation in 1846, by Dr. Morton, a dentist of Boston. 

25. Glower.— Scotch word. A hard stare. 

“As lightsomely I glower'd abroad.”— Burns. 

26. Happed.— Probably from the Anglo-Saxon, heapian , to heap up. 
To cover in order to conceal. To wrap up so as to protect from the 
cold, rain, or snow. 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


19 


her up carefully, — and, resting on Janies and me, Ailie went 
to her room, Rab following. We put her to bed. James 
took off his heavy shoes, crammed with tackets, heel-capt 
and toe-capt, and put them carefully under the table, say- 
ing, “Maister John, Pm for nane o’ yer strynge nurse 
bodies for Ailie. Pll be her nurse, and I’ll gang aboot on 
my stockin’ soles as canny as pussy.” And so he did ; and 
handy and clever, and swift and tender as any woman, was 
that horny-handed, snell , 27 peremptory little man. Every 
thing she got he gave her ; he seldom slept ; and often I saw 
his small, shrewd eyes out of the darkness, fixed on her. 
As before, they spoke little. 

Rab behaved well, never moving, showing us how meek 
and gentle he could be, and occasionally, in his sleep, letting 
us know that he was demolishing some adversary. He took 
a walk with me every day, generally to the Candlemaker 
Row ; but he was somber and mild ; declined doing battle, 
though some fit cases offered, "and indeed submitted to sun- 
dry indignities; and was always very ready to turn and 
came faster back, and trotted up the stair with much light- 
ness, and went straight to that door. 

Jess, the mare, had been sent, with her weather-worn 
cart, to Howgate, and had doubtless her own dim and 
placid meditations and confusions, on the absence of her 
master and Rab, and her unnatural freedom from the road 
and her cart. 

For some days Ailie did well. The wound healed “by 
the first intention ;” 28 for as James said, “ Oor Ailie’s skin’s 
ower clean to beil.”* * The students came in quiet and 
anxious, and surrounded her bed. She said she liked to see 
their young, honest faces. The surgeon dressed her, and 
spoke to her in his own short, kind way, pitying her 
through his eyes, Rab and James outside the circle,— Rab 

27. Snell. — A common word in the Teutonic tongues, meaning short, 
quick, wiry, brisk or severe. A frost is spoken of as snell . 

28. First intention.— Healing by “first intention” occurs when the 
lips of a wound knit together without the formation of “matter,” 
(pus), as when the parts cut by a sharp knife are brought into close 
contact and quickly heal without much inflammation, 

* Over-ready to heal. 


20 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


being now reconciled, and even cordial, and having made 
up his mind that as yet nobody required worrying, but as 
you may suppose semper par atus.* 

So far well ; but four days after the operation my patient 
had a sudden and long shivering, a “ groosin’,’ ’ as she called 
it. I saw her soon after ; her eyes were too bright, her 
cheek colored ; she was restless, and ashamed of being so ; 
the balance was lost ; mischief had begun. On looking at 
the wound, a blush of red told the secret ; her pulse was 
rapid, her breathing anxious and quick, she wasn’t herself, 
as she said, and was vexed at her restlessness. We tried 
what we could, James did every thing, was every where ; 
never in the way, never out of it. Eab subsided under the 
table into a dark place, and was motionless, all but his eye, 
which followed every one. Ailie got worse ; began to wan- 
der in her mind, gently ; was more demonstrative in her 
ways to James, rapid in her questions, and sharp at times. 
He was vexed, and said, 11 She was never that way afore ; 
no, never.” For a time she knew her head was wrong, and 
was always asking our pardon — the dear, gentle old woman ; 
then delirium set in strong, without pause. Her brain gave 
way, and then came that terrible spectacle, 

‘‘The intellectual power, through words and things, 

Went sounding on its dim and perilous way 

she sang bits of old songs and psalms, stopping suddenly, 
mingling the Psalms of David, and the diviner words of 
his Son and Lord, w T ith homely odds and ends and scraps 
of ballads. 

Nothing more touching, or in a sense more strangely 
beautiful, did I ever witness. Her tremulous, rapid, affec- 
tionate, eager, Scotch voice — the swift, aimless, bewildered 
mind, the baffled utterance, the bright and perilous eye ; 
some wild words, some household cares, something for 
James, the names of the dead, Rab called rapidly and in a 
“fremyt”f voice, and he starting up, surprised, and slink- 
ing off as if he were to blame somehow, or had been dream- 


* Always ready, 
f querulous, trembling. 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


21 


ing ne heard. Many eager questions and beseechings 
which James and I could make nothing of, and on which 
she seemed to set her all, "and then sink back ununderstood. 
It was very sad, but better than many things that are not 
called sad. James hovered about, put out and miserable, 
but active and exact as ever ; read to her, when there was 
a lull, short bits from the Psalms, prose and metre, chant- 
ing the latter in his own rude and serious way, showing 
great knowledge of the fit words, bearing up like a man, 
and doating over her as his “ainAilie.” “Ailie, ma wo- 
man \ v “ Ma ain bonnie wee dawtie !” 

“The end was drawing on: the golden bowl was break- 
ing ; 28 the silver cord was fast being loosed — that animula 
blandula , vagula , hospes , comesque , 29 was about to flee. The 
body and the soul — companions for sixty years — were being 
sundered, and taking leave. She was walking, alone, 
through the valley of that shadow, into which one day we 
must all enter — and yet she was not alone, for we know 
whose rod and staff were comforting her . 30 

One night she had fallen quiet, and as we hoped, asleep ; 
her eyes were shut. We put down the gas and sat watch- 
ing her. Suddenly she sat up in bed, and taking a bed- 
gown which was lying on it rolled up, she held it eagerly 
to her breast — to the right side. We could see her eyes 
bright with surpassing tenderness and joy, bending over 
this bundle of clothes. She held it as a woman holds her 
sucking child ; opening out her nightgown impatiently, and 
holding it close, and brooding over it, and murmuring fool- 
ish little words, as one whom his mother comforteth, and 
who sucks and is satisfied. It was pitiful and strange to 
see her wasting dying look, keen and yet vague — her im- 
mense love. 

“Preserve me !” groaned James, giving away. And 
then she rocked back and forward, as if to make it sleep, 

28. Cf. Eccles. xii, 6. 

29. Animula blandula , pleasing life. 

Vagula , hastening away. 

Hospes , guest. 

Comesque and companion. 

30. Cf. Psalm xxiii. 


22 


BAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


hushing it, and wasting on it her infinite fondness. “ Wae’s 
me, doctor; I declare she’s thinkin’ it’s that bairn.” 
“What bairn?” “The only bairn we ever had; our wee 
Mysie, and she’s in the Kingdom, forty years and mair.” 
It was plainly true : the pain in the breast telling its urgent 
story to a bewildered, ruined brain, was misread and mis- 
taken ; it suggested to her the uneasiness of a breast full of 
milk, and then the child ; and so again once more they 
were together, and she had her ain wee Mysie in her bosom. 

This was the close. She sank rapidly : the delirium left 
her; but, as she whispered, she was “ clean silly ;” it was 
the lightening before the final darkness. After having for 
some time lain still — her eyes shut, she said, “James!” 
He came close to her, and lifting up her calm, clear, beau- 
tiful eyes, she gave him a long look, turned to me kindly 
but shortly, looked for Rab but could not see him, then 
turned to her husband again, as if she would never leave off 
looking, shut her eyes and composed herself. She lay for 
some time breathing quick, and passed away so gently, that 
when we thought she was gone, James in his old-fashioned 
way, held the mirror to her face. After a long pause, one 
small spot of dimness was breathed out; it vanished away, 
and never returned, leaving the blank clear darkness of the 
mirror without a stain. “What is your life? it is even 
a vapor, which appeareth for a little time, and then vanish- 
eth away .” 31 

Rab all this time had been full awake and motionless ; 
he came forward beside us ; Ailie’s hand, which James had 
held, was hanging down ; it was soaked with his tears ; Rab 
licked it all over carefully, looked at her, and returned to 
his place under the table. 

James-and I sat, I don’t know how long, but for sometime 
— saying nothing : he started up abruptly, and with some 
noise went to the table, and putting his right, fore and mid- 
dle fingers each into a shoe, pulled them out, and put them 
on, breaking one of the leather latchets, and muttering in 
anger, “ I never did the like o’ that afore ” 


31. Cf. James iv, 14. 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


23 


I believe ne never did ; nor after either. “ Rab !” he said 
roughly, and pointing with his thumb to the bottom of the 
bed. Rab leapt up, and settled himself ; his head and eye to 
the dead face. “ Maister John, ye’ll wait for me,” said the 
carrier, and disappeared in the darkness, thundering down 
stairs in his heavy shoes. I ran to a front window : there 
he was, already round the house, and out at the gate, flee- 
ing like a shadow. 

I was afraid about him, and yet not afraid ; ss I sat down 
beside Rab, and being wearied, fell asleep. I awoke from a 
sudden noise outside. It was November, and there had 
been a heavy fall of snow. Rab was in statu quo ; 32 he 
heard the noise too, and plainly knew it, but never moved. 
I looked out ; and there, at the gate, in the dim morning — 
for the sun was not up, was Jess and the cart — a cloud of 
steam rising from the old mare. I did not see James ; he 
was already at the door, and came up to the stairs, and met 
me. It was less than three hours since he left, and he must 
have posted out — who knows how — to Howgate, full nine 
miles off ; yoked Jess, and driven her astonished into town. 
He had an armful of blankets, and was streaming with 
perspiration. He nodded to me, spread out on the floor two 
pairs of clean old blankets, having at their corners “A. G., 
1794,” in large letters in red worsted. These were the 
initials of Alison Graeme, and James may have looked in at 
her from without — himself unseen but not unthought of— 
when he was “wat, wat 33 and weary,” and after having 
walked many a mile over the hills, may have seen her sit- 
ting, while “a’ the lave were sleepin’;” 34 and by the fire- 
light working her name on the blankets, for her ain James’ 
bed. 

He motioned Rab down, and taking his wife in his arms, 
laid her in the blankets, and happed her carefully and 
firmly up, leaving the face uncovered ; and then lifting her, 
he nodded again sharply to me, and with a resolved but 


32. In the same position. 

33. Wet. 

34. All the rest were sleeping. 


24 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


utterly miserable face, strode along the passage, and down 
stairs, followed by Rab. I followed with a light ; but he 
didn’t need it. I went out, holding stupidly the candle in 
my hand in the calm frosty air ; we were soon at the gate. 
I could have helped him, but I saw he was not to be meddled 
with, and he was strong, and did not need it. He laid her 
down as tenderly, as safely, as he had lifted her out ten days 
before — as tenderly as when he had her first in his arms 
when she was only “A. G.” — sorted her, leaving that beau- 
tiful sealed face open to the heavens ; and then taking Jess 
by the head, he moved away. He did not notice me, 
neither did Rab, who presided behind the cart. 

I stood till they passed through the long shadow of the 
College, and turned up Nicholson Street. I heard the soli- 
tary cart sound through the streets, and die away and come 
again ; and I returned, thinking of that company going up 
Libberton Brae, then along Roslin Muir, the morning light 
touching the Pentlands and making them on-looking 
ghosts ; then down the hill through Auchindinny woods, 
past “haunted Woodhouselee and as daybreak came 
sweeping up the bleak Lammermuirs, and fell on his own 
door, the company would stop, and James would take the 
key, and lift Ailie up again, laying her on her own bed, 
and, having put Jess up, would return with Rab and shut 
the door. 

James buried his wife, with his neighbors mourning, Rab 
inspected the solemnity from a distance. It was snow, and 
that black ragged hole would look strange in the midst of 
the swelling spotless cushion of white. James looked after 
everything ; then rather suddenly fell ill, and took to bed ; 
was insensible when the doctor came, and soon died. A 
sort of low fever was prevailing in the village, and his want 
of sleep, his exhaustion, and his misery, made him apt to 
take it. The grave was not difficult to reopen. A fresh fall 
of snow had again made all things white and smooth ; Rab 
once more looked on, and slunk home to the stable. 

And what of Rab ? I asked for him next week at the new 
carrier who got the goodwill of James’s business, and was 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


25 


now master of Jess and her cart. “ How’s Rah?” He put 
me off, and said rather rudely, “What’s your business wi’ 
thedowg?” I was not to be so put of. “Where’s Rab?” 
He, getting confused and red, and intermeddling with his 
hair, said, “’Deed sir, Rab’s died.” “Dead! what did he 
die of?” “Weel, sir,” said he, getting redder, “he didna 
exactly dee ; he was killed. I had to brain him wi’ a rack- 
pin ; there was nae doing’ wi’ him. He lay in the treviss 35 
wi’ the mear, and wadna come oot. I tempit him wi’ the 
kail 36 and meat, but be wad tak naething, and keepit me 
frae feedin’ the beast, and he was aye gur gurrin ’, 37 and grup 
gruppin ’ 38 me by the legs. I was laith 39 to make awa wi’ 
the old dowg, his like wasne atween this and Thornhill, — 
but, ’deed, sir, I could do naething else.” I believed him. 
Fit end for Rab, quick and complete. His teeth and his 
friends gone, why should he keep the peace and be civil ? 


MORE ABOUT “RAB.” 

Of Rab I have little to say, indeed have little right to 
speak of him as one of “our dogs;” but nobody will be 
sorry to hear anything of that noble fellow. Ailie, the day 
or two after the operation, when she was well and cheery, 
spoke about him, and said she would tell me fine stories 
when I came out, as I promised to do, to see her at Howgate. 
I asked her how James came to get him. She told me that 
one day she saw James coming down from Leadburn with 
the cart ; he had been away west, getting eggs and butter, 
cheese and hens for Edinburgh. She saw he was in some 

85. Stall. 

36. Kail.— A vegetable commonly used in soup by the Scotch. Hence, 
any soup may be called kail. 

37. Growl, growling. 

38. Grab, grabbing. 

39. Loath, reluctant, “I wad be laith to rin an chase thee.”— Burns, 


26 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


trouble, and on looking, there was what she thought 
young calf being dragged, or, as she called it, “haurled,” at 
the back of the cart. James was in front, and when he 
came up, very warm and very angry, she saw that there was 
a huge young dog tied to the cart, struggling and pulling 
back with all his might, and as she said 1 1 looking fearsom. ’ ’ 
James, who was out of breath and temper, being past his 
time, explained to Ailie, that this “ muckle brute o’ a 
whalp” had been worrying sheep, and terrifying everybody 
at Sir George Montgomery’s at Macbie Hill, and that Sir 
George had ordered him to be hanged, which, however, was 
sooner said than done, as “ the thief” showed his intentions 
of dying hard. James came up just as Sir George had sent 
for his gun ; and as the dog had more than shown a liking 
for him, he said he “ wad gie him a chance and so he tied 
him to his cart. Young Rab, fearing some mischief, had 
been entering a series of protests all the way, and nearly 
strangling himself to spite James and Jess, besides giving Jess 
more than usual to do. “I wish I had let Sir George pit 
that charge into him, the thrawn brute,” said James. But 
Ailie had seen that in his foreleg there was a splinter of 
wood, which he had likely got when objecting to be hanged, 
and that he was miserably lame. 

So she got James to leave him with her, and go straight 
into Edinburgh. She gave him water, and by her women’s 
wit got his lame paw under a door, so that he couldn’t sud- 
denly get at her, then with a quick firm hand she plucked 
out the splinter, and put in an ample meal. She went in 
some time after, taking no notice of him, and he came 
limping up, and laid his great jaws in her lap ; from that 
moment they were “chief,” as she said, James finding him 
mansuete and civil when he returned. 

She said it was Rab’s habit to make his appearance ex- 
actly half an hour before his master, trotting in full of 
importance, as if to say, “He’s all right, he’ll be here.” 
One morning James came without him. He had left Edin- 
burgh very early, and in coming near Auchindinny, at a 
lonely part of the road, a man sprang out on him, and 


RAB AND HIS FRIENDS. 


27 


demanded his money. James, who was a cool hand, said, 
“Weel a weel, let me get it,” and stepping back, he said to 
Rab, “Speak till him, my man.” In an instant Rab was 
standing over him, threatening strangulation if he stirred. 
James pushed on leaving Rab in charge ; he looked back, 
and saw that every attempt to rise was summarily put 
down. As he was telling Ailie the story, up came Rab with 
that great swing of his. It turned out that the robber 
was a Howgate lad, the worthless son of a neighbor, and 
Rab knowing him had let him cheaply off. 

“ Our Dogs* in Spare Hours (First Series). 


* The young student will find some most delightful reading in this 
interesting essay by the genial Doctor Brown, on his favorite dogs. 



TEST QUESTIONS FOR REVIEW, 


1. When and where was Dr. John Brown born? 

2. What can you say of his ancestors ? 

3. What famous school did he attend ? 

4. What noted men went to this school? 

5. In what essay will you find a touching tribute to his father? 

6. What famous man did Dr. Brown used to meet in his boyhood? 

7. After leaving the High School what profession did he adopt? 

8. In what hospital did he become a student? 

9. With what famous surgeon did he begin a life-long friendship ? 

10. What tribute of affection does he pay to, this surgeon in his 
writings? 

11. How is Minto Hospital associated with Dr. Brown’s most famous 
sketch? 

12. Where did the young Doctor begin practice ? 

13. Mention the incident that Dickens told at an Edinburgh dinner. 

14. Where did Dr. Brown next begin to practice? 

15. What can you say of his subsequent professional career? 

16. Was he successful as a physician, and why? 

17. What kind of a man was Dr. Brown personally? 

18. What can you say of his fits of depression ? 

19. Did they affect his life to any extent? 

20. When did he die? 

21. Under what title did he begin to publish his writings? 

22. What two sketches established his reputation? 

23. Tell in a general way the good Doctor’s favorite themes. 

24. Why do you suppose he liked to write of the old-time Scotch 
scholars ? 

25. Why was he able to write graphically and truthfully of dogs? 

26. What evidence from his writings that Dr. Brown loved and knew 
children? 

27. Have you read his “Pet Marjorie;” if so how do you like it? 

28. What are some of its weak points? its strong points? 

29. Why do you suppose that Dr. Brown loved and appreciated 
Thackeray’s writings to the extent that he did? 

30. John Leech, the artist, was another favorite. Why? 

31. What charming descriptions of Scottish scenery may be found in 
Dr. Brown’s writings? 

32. Did he excel in this respect, and why? 

33. What is his most famous sketch? 

34. Why does “Rab” keep its hold upon the public during these 
many years ? 

35. What traits of Scottish character does it illustrate? 

36. It is apparently merely an incident in the life of a lowly Scotch 
family; why does it fasten itself upon the memory and appeal so 
strongly to our feelings? 

37. Mention the marked characteristics of the dog, Rab, as delineated 
by the author? 

38. Do the occasional Latin words and phrases mar the style of the 
author? 

39. By what words would you describe the author’s style of writing? 

40. Was “Rab and His Friends” founded on fact? 

41. What was one object the author had in writing the sketch? 

42. What can you tell of Dr. Brown’s wonderful insight into and 
hearty appreciation of Scotch character? 







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